The
BruceVC Express:
A glorious journey of fulfilling exploration which actually manages to strike a balance between discovery, combat and systems. Unlike so many other efforts within this subgenre, WoX actually delivers on both the scope
and the gameplay. There are many games who do one or two of the things WoX does better than WoX. But there are none that offer them all to such a satisfying degree across the board.
I admit I love it more for its ideas than for its elegance (what it promises vs how it plays). It has so many of the elements modern RPGs are only finally starting to delve into now when it comes to connecting game systems to aesthetics/roleplaying choices - which includes trying to do stuff with choose-your-own-adventure style mechanics. Basically what old RPGs did so frikkin' well was laying the foundation for combat and exploration mechanics. They rarely tried to make a good game out of their story and setting. When they did (like Betrayal of Krondor and later Planescape: Torment), the game was almost an afterthought - the setting and the story were built from words and writing (some might say I'm neglecting to mention the Ultima games here, which is probably a fair point to be honest, I just never enjoyed playing them much).
Then after older games came this Mass Effect-wave of narrative games which tried to bring the character interaction of roleplaying to the forefront. How? By just doing away with mechanics entirely and boiling everything down to story choices and writing. Hence the (to my mind false) schism between combat and storyfags which bogs down Codex cRPG debate to this day.
We're playing games - mechanics should always be the foundation for anything you're trying to do, whether that's telling a story or making a combat system. Alas, this basic tenet was largely ignored in the 00s and 10s.
And thus, like the one ring, the design document that was Darklands was lost: that RPG mechanics could be used to used to do storytelling, atmosphere, setting and character interaction as well.
Modern RPGs seem to slowly be re-realizing this (I won't mention a certain unmentionable modern game for fear of bringing down the hivemind's hammer here), but it's a tragedy that we're still so far from delivering on Darklands' promise given that it put down such a solid foundation almost 30 years ago.
That, and then the fact that it's just a darn cool setting.
1 point:
Betrayal at Krondor
Best (maybe even
only good) storyfag RPG of the games we're voting on.
Dark Sun: Shattered Lands
Cool setting, good combat, fun story, decent polish.
Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos
Pure nostalgia and beautiful aesthetics. It really doesn't have much else going for it.
